


madness in three acts

by orgiastique



Series: love is merely a madness [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Family Loss, Found Family, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Past Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Roommates, Social Anxiety, Strangers to Lovers, quiet flutters of the heart are my entire sense of justice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22987849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orgiastique/pseuds/orgiastique
Summary: Sylvain and Felix are college roommates who fall in love quietly under city lights.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Series: love is merely a madness [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1881709
Comments: 66
Kudos: 411





	1. act one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [birdsandivory](https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdsandivory/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wishing the happiest of birthdays to [ivory](https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdsandivory/pseuds/birdsandivory), with whom i have had the great pleasure of sharing countless conversations about our affinity for that to the ends of the universe type of love. so here is my take on that, in three acts.
> 
> thanks to lyn and asa for betaing!
> 
> EDIT (8/12/2020): in celebration of this fic getting a sequel, i've gone back and done some revisions so hopefully the story reads better as a whole. if you've been here once before and notice some changes, that's why! ♥

Everyone has a favorite story.

Maybe it takes place in a small town, population of no more than a couple hundred people. The barely beating town center is home only to a gas station, convenience store, and liquor shop. Mostly, there are fields and farms and chicken. Some cows. The blue-green grass sways in the wind, and the air is cool and clean. Wide-eyed visitors from the city come to fall in love with the untouched beauty of nature, to let themselves be humbled by the austerity of virgin earth. Tilting their faces up toward a sky thrown wide open, they feed their appetite for wonder from overflowing saucers of stardust.

And that’s all fine and good.

But this is a story about the city. How people can fall just as softly, barely a whisper of hearts, under the burning gaze of city lights. Two people could be standing in their own bubble at a busy street corner as determined commuters rush on by. Engulfed by the sea of people, they open their eyes wide against the sting of saltwater in order to see each other properly.

A half-smile forms on their lips, and then the shutter clicks.

* * *

Felix is home alone when he opens the letter.

 _Dear Mr. Felix Fraldarius,_ it says. _Congratulations! We are pleased to inform you that you have been selected to receive the Saint Seiros Foundation Scholarship. In addition to covering full tuition, this distinguished award will include a stipend for room and board for four years at Garreg Mach University..._

His eyes drift off the page toward the sound of wind howling through the trees. Another snowstorm. The snowscape of Areadbhar is so white and brittle that it might as well be made of bones.

He looks back down at the acceptance letter, breathing out long and slow. If he were Annette, he would whoop for joy and maybe dance like the snowflakes. But he is Felix, and even the thought of that is mortifying.

So, after reading the letter over once again, he puts down the sheet of paper and thinks about a faraway place.

* * *

It’s an eight-hour drive by car from Areadbhar to GMU, but it takes twelve by train and bus. Technically, Felix has a driver’s license and his dad had offered him a used car to take to college. But realistically, Felix’s driver’s license is just a scrap of laminated paper he takes around as an ID. He has not touched a steering wheel since he sideswiped his dad’s boss’s BMW at the parking lot of the BX.

As exhausting as the trip is, Felix finds it hard to relax. He brought his favorite sword maintenance manual to review on the ride, but his mind keeps wondering about the stranger he’s meant to room with for an entire year. He hopes he’s a neat person, at least; that he won’t touch Felix’s swords without permission; that he won’t bring home questionable company. Felix has never lived with anyone outside his immediate family, and he just needs to _know_ , already, what to expect.

But, sad trombone, his roommate isn’t even there to relieve the suspense of the wait when Felix arrives.

(And this, after being harassed four times—once for every transfer of busses—about carrying "weapons" onto public transportation. Apparently, there are _rules_ about this in the city.)

The apartment is dark. Empty.

Throwing down the bags and suitcases he lugged up three flights of stairs, Felix slams the door shut behind himself. He feels around for the light switch until his palm smashes right into it. An overhead lamp blinks on, filling the entryway with yellow light. As he wanders through the apartment, familiarizing himself with his new surroundings, he pulls open every door he passes. His new home has two bedrooms divided by a cramped full bath, a combined living-dining area, and a kitchen separated from the living room by a breakfast counter. (There is a closet lined with heavy drapes with sheets of blank-looking paper hanging from a string strung across the room. There are metal trays of liquid on the counter. Felix closes the door quickly and prays against cult involvement.)

The apartment is fine. It’s many times smaller than his dad’s place, so the vacancy feels marginally less suffocating. Someone’s going to be home soon. In the meantime, he’ll just find something to drink and get himself cleaned up.

He heads toward the fridge, wondering if it’ll be stocked. He pauses with one hand on the door to stare at the note—jotted down on a bright pink index card and tacked to the freezer door with a lewd magnet—addressed to him.

Or, to ‘ _gorgeous’_ , rather.

Ugh.

> _Hey gorgeous ;)_
> 
> _Welcome! I'm at work right now, but I'll be back by 10. You can visit me at the Beast Burger down the street if you're ever eager to meet before then. Otherwise, feel free to make yourself at home._ _♥_
> 
> _~ Sylvain_

Felix blinks back up at the digital clock on the stove, but he doesn’t really register the time. His mind is hung up on the flirty tone of the message. He wonders if this _Sylvain_ is somehow under the mistaken impression that he is getting a female roommate. He might just talk like that to everyone. Or maybe, he’s perfectly clear on _Felix Hugo Fraldarius_ being a man, and men are exactly the type he prefers to flirt with.

Felix’s chest tightens a little at the thought. He bites his lip, staring for too long at the careless scribble of a heart on the card.

* * *

Felix wants to make clear for the official record that he is _not_ a bath person. But he'd found the salts in his bag when he was unpacking—something frightfully fragrant that he’d vetoed when Annette tried to sneak it into his duffel the first time—and felt a little homesick at the memory of Annette helping him pick out what to bring to college.

 _Take a piece of home with you_ , he can hear her chirping into his ear.

It's true, at least, that out of everything from their hick little town, a piece of Annette is the thing he'd want to bring with him the most. Still, it was with great reluctance and suspicion that he'd sprinkled the alarmingly green crystals into his bathwater, and now it is with great regret that he sits immersed to his neck in fucking tea-tree broth, facing the consequences of stupid, useless sentimentality.

The bathroom door swings open.

An outcry against invasion of privacy dies on Felix's tongue as a man with his hair up in flames comes into view. The man, whom Felix can only assume is his roommate _Sylvain_ , leans against the doorframe with the practiced insouciance of someone posing for a photoshoot, long legs crossed at the ankles. A smile stretches loose and easy across his wide mouth. His lips are so, so red.

Logically, Felix knows that not every ginger has pale-colored irises like Annette, but it still catches him off-guard to be staring into eyes the color of burnt butterscotch. He finds his throat very dry. Perhaps, it is because his new roommate is a tall glass of—

"Hey, sweetheart."

Felix blanches. Is this better or worse than _gorgeous_ , or is it all the same?

"My name is Felix," he corrects.

Amusement dances across Sylvain's face. "Can't call a cutie by the wrong name if you stick to terms of endearment, you know?" he says. And _winks_.

 _Oh_. The butterflies in Felix's stomach drop dead. _My new roommate is a tall glass of trash juice_.

"But you're free to call me anything you want," Sylvain adds in a low purr.

"Can I call you Trash Juice," Felix grits.

There's a split-second when Sylvain’s features fall slack with surprise before his (obscenely gorgeous) mouth pops open in laughter. The sound leaves his throat in staccato _ha ha ha_ s, rising toward a decibel that’s downright obnoxious for this time of night. It makes Felix wince.

"So, _Felix_." Sylvain crosses his arms. (Fucking Sothis on a cupcake, who _dared_ to give this bastard forearms like that?) "Missed you at Beast Burger tonight. I was hoping you'd drop by." He says this with the subtlest hint of a whine in his voice, but Felix doesn’t manage to drag his eyes away from those arms to check if he’s also pouting with his stupid, cherry-red lips. "It was such a slow night, and I was bored out of my mind. Watching Ingrid—oh, she's this girl I grew up with—lose her cool over pretty girls is only funny the first twenty times before it’s just clumsy customer service."

_So Ingrid isn’t one of his sweethearts, then._

_Because pretty_ girls _make her lose her cool. And that’s okay. Is that how it works in the city? No to martial arts equipment on pubic transportation, but yes to casual queers at burger joints?_

"You told me to make myself at home," Felix says. "So I was doing that."

Sylvain hums, "I see, I see…" and he trails off. Felix hopes that this means he’s ready to end this belabored attempt at small talk. The water is getting cold. Felix lifts his gaze from studying his pruned fingertips in the water just as Sylvain pauses with his hand on the doorknob.

"Well, anyway." He shoots Felix another smile. "You probably haven't had a chance to eat yet, huh. I'll go heat up some leftovers from work."

A beat of silence passes. Then, the door clicks shut again.

It isn't until Felix is sitting at the breakfast counter—long hair dripping water onto his night shirt; Sylvain seated across from him, chattering meanderingly about his coworker Ingrid's epic strife for wife; Sylvain's infuriatingly large hands knocking the food out of Felix's grasp by accident as he gesticulates animatedly—that Felix peers up from the lukewarm hamburger and wilted fries spread before him and realizes: Sylvain smiles much better when he thinks Felix isn't looking.

The butterscotch melts, taking place of the madness in his eyes.

* * *

The cult closet, apparently, is a converted darkroom. Upon closer inspection of the apartment, Felix can see parts and pieces of Sylvain's photography equipment tucked all over the place. It’s a surprisingly wholesome and sensitive hobby for someone who sneaks back into the apartment at 4AM three nights in a row.

Well, it _seemed_ like a respectable hobby until Felix asks him what he takes pictures of.

Sylvain taps his chin, tilting his head to one side. (The stupid bastard, he must think he’s so cute.) "Girls, mostly?" he answers. Following Felix's line of vision toward the spare lenses he pulled out to clean, he adds, "You can touch, if you want."

Felix huffs like he hasn't spent the past five minutes itching to spin the round lens like a hamster wheel. "Is that your entire personality? Women?"

"I wouldn’t say that it's a personality trait so much as an _inclination_ ," Sylvain says. "Also, I get paid pretty good money for it."

Felix's mind springs to connect the dots between this piece of information and the walks of shame. "Wait, you get—"

"I freelance for a teen magazine," Sylvain says, putting up a hand. "Just FYI, the thing _you're_ thinking of, I do for free."

 _"Did I ask?!"_ Felix feels his cheeks flush. The feeling stirring in his chest is irritation, surely. "And do you plan to still be doing that after the quarter starts?"

"Do what?" Sylvain blinks innocently, one corner of his lips curled like the leaflet of a touch-me-not.

"The—" Felix waves his hands. He doesn’t know why he's even making a fuss of this, especially with a guy whom he barely knows and whose life he's in no position to judge or control, except that this is his home, too, and—"I'm a light sleeper!" (He is not.) "It wakes me up whenever you come banging back in at the asscrack of dawn. You do _not_ step light."

Sylvain’s eyebrows drift up to his hairline. "Oh, I'm sorry." The way the apology tumbles out of him, as if he's been caught off-guard by the honesty of his own feelings, makes Felix deflate a little. He scrunches in on himself, arms folded in a tight knot over his chest in the pose that Annette calls the 'angry gnome'. This is unfair and stupid because Annette is a whole 20 cm more of a gnome than he is. "Nobody's ever mentioned that was problem before."

"Well, it's a problem for me," Felix insists.

"Okay, Felix," Sylvain says. Felix stiffens against the jolt of electricity that startles his heart at the soft roll of his name off Sylvain's tongue. "I'll take care of it."

"Well. Good."

Sylvain chuckles, leaning back with his hands tucked behind his head. He peers up at Felix through the thick, doll-like lashes that frame his eyes. "Look at us, settling our roommate disputes like adults," he says, as if he hadn't simply folded to Felix's demands. "I'm getting hungry. You wanna have dinner early tonight?"

They finish dinner just as the sun sets. After they clean up the dishes together ( _when had they started doing that?_ _)_ , Sylvain says he's going to head out for a bit.

The look that Felix shoots him must be sharper than he intends. This, he can only blame on the long, narrow eyes he inherited from his father. His brother had the same eyes, too, and people were constantly cowering under his gaze, too.

But Sylvain isn't so much cowering as he is chortling quietly to himself as he heads for the front door. Keys in hand, he wiggles his fingers in a _toodles_ -like motion. "Don't worry, Sleeping Beauty. I remember our promise."

It turns out that Sylvain is a person who keeps his promises.

* * *

Felix hadn't been prepared to meet Ingrid: Sylvain's childhood friend and lesbian extraordinaire.

She herself is a blond of average height and build, but she tows in another blond who is possibly even taller and broader than Sylvain. Out of pure pettiness, Felix decides he does not like the gorilla dressed in a blue polo shirt. He misses his itty-bitty friend Annette and her itty-bitty boyfriend Ashe.

When the pair let themselves in with what must be a spare key (that Felix hadn’t known existed), Sylvain is in the shower and Felix is seated on the floor in front of the couch previewing his orgo textbook for the next day. He's partially hidden by the breakfast bar, so they don’t see him right away. He doesn't make himself known either, quietly observing the way they move around the kitchen with an air of being well-acquainted with the place. Makes sense, given the spare key (that, again, _Felix_ _was not informed of existing_ ).

When Blond Gorilla rounds into the living room and his bright blue eyes land on Felix, he lets out a quiet _ahh!_ of surprise. Almost immediately, his features rearrange into a smile so… _stately_ , Felix is reminded of the princes from Annette's shoujo manga.

"Oh, I’m so very sorry. Did I startle you?" Blond Gorilla asks, despite the fact that it was clearly Felix who gave him a scare by watching them like a cat from through a slit in his favorite box. "You must be Sylvain's new roommate."

Felix stares down at the hand extended toward him. The girl joins Blond Gorilla's side.

"Felix, right?" She smiles. "The chemistry major."

They watch him for a response. Felix flushes from both the attention and the knowledge that he's obviously been talked about amongst people he's never met before. He squints at them menacingly to hide his discomfort. "Shouldn't you introduce yourselves first?"

Blond Gorilla lets out another _ahh_ , sheepish this time, retracting the hand he'd offered. "You're absolutely right. My apologies for our rudeness, Felix," he says. "We're Sylvain's friends from childhood. This here is Ingrid Galatea." He motions to the girl. Felix had assumed as much. "And I'm—"

"Your Highness!"

A flood of relief crashes through Felix when Sylvain bursts out from his room. The comfort is short-lived, though, because while Sylvain has managed to throw on a shirt, there's nothing but a pair of tiny red boxer shorts covering his lower half. As he strides toward them, dripping water all over the hardwood floor, the thickly-corded muscles in his thighs power each long stride.

Felix rips his eyes away before he's caught ogling like a creep.

"—And Ingrid, too, hey what's up," Sylvain adds when Ingrid motions to herself pointedly. "I thought we were meeting at the theater."

"Change of plans," she says, dismissive of the pout forming on Sylvain’s lips. (When did Felix’s eyes find their way back to Sylvain again?) "We’re here to meet your new roommate, since you seemed so intent on hiding him away for yourself."

"Ingrid!" Sylvain hisses.

"Yes?" Ingrid crosses her arms, nose upturned in challenge.

Sylvain makes a garbled noise, then forces a weak smile at Felix. "Fine, see? Here is my new roommate. Felix. In the flesh. Happy?"

Instead of replying, Ingrid shifts her eyes between Felix and Sylvain. Sylvain catches her gaze at one point, and Felix looks on as a silent conversation takes place. One that would appear to involve a lot of groveling on Sylvain's part.

Caught in the middle of this exchange, Dimitri offers Felix a helpless smile. "Please, call me Dimitri," he says. "I wouldn't want you to think that you should conform to addressing me as they do. In fact, I would prefer if you don't."

"Oh, don’t you worry, Your Highness." Sylvain pops out of his telepathic sidebar with Ingrid to throw a chummy arm around Dimitri's shoulders. "Felix has quite the way with nicknames. What was it that you called me the first night?" He rubs his chin in a pathetic play at recollection. He is a terrible actor. "Oh, that's right— _Trash Juice_."

Ingrid snorts so hard, she must suck her sinuses into her brain. "Not even the solid stuff that you can just throw out easily, huh. But like, that brown slop you gotta mop out of the bottom of the can." She nods. "Accurate."

"Hey, he didn’t say any of that!" Sylvain protests.

"You're right, _I_ did." Ingrid sighs, turning to Felix. "Seriously, good luck with this one."

"I think we'll be fine," Felix says simply.

He doesn’t have any childhood friends of his own; the closest he's got is Annette, whom he started talking to in high school. Their sense of distance—or lack thereof—toward one another is strange to him. They toss around shade like they're trying out for the Olympic volleyball team but stand huddled together like vagabonds around a pot-bellied fire.

Exasperated parents lecturing their teenage son might also be an apt metaphor. Sylvain is still dripping water onto the floor.

Something blooms in Felix’s chest, sprouting long vines that choke the breath from his lungs. But before he has the chance to evaluate the feeling, Dimitri is asking if he'd like to join them for the movie.

Felix looks down into his lap at the electron-pushing diagrams. He slams the textbook shut.

He can see a movie.

* * *

Felix enjoys peace and solitude, so he eats his lunch in the science quad at two every day. It's right next to where he has orgo lab at 3PM, and there's less competition for a table at this time. For the most part, he’s able to get through his sandwich (six slices of bacon and one leaf of lettuce between white bread) without getting badgered by constant queries of _May I borrow this chair?_

It's the last Friday of the first week of school, and the sun beams down over the campus like the statue of Saint Seiros at the main gate. (Lady gives him the creeps.) Tossing his brown paper bag down onto his usual table, Felix repositions his chair halfway under the sun and halfway in the shade of a big magnolia tree, before settling in. In the quiet of the courtyard, the crinkle of the paper bag is obnoxiously loud when he reaches in for his sandwich.

A tray slides in next to his bag.

"My friend Felix, mind if I join you?" Sylvain flops down into the seat opposite him without waiting for answer.

"Aren't your classes on the opposite side of campus?" Felix asks, watching Sylvain stab his fork through the plastic of his disposable cutlery set.

"Am I not welcome on your turf?" Sylvain adds to the litany of unanswered questions.

He twirls his fork over a knuckle—once, twice—before spearing a slab of meat drowning in purple sauce. He cuts the meat into little cubes before popping them into his mouth. Sylvain is a clean eater and doesn't let a drop of the sauce stain the table or his cheeks. Some of it clings to his lips, though, glossy and sinfully tantalizing—even to Felix, who hates anything sweet or sweet-adjacent.

Especially to Felix, who stares and stares and stares until he's dizzy in the midday sun.

Sylvain pauses with his fork halfway to his mouth, butterscotch eyes stuck on Felix.

"You want a bite?" asks Sylvain in yet another question.

This one, Felix answers.

He wants.


	2. act two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please note that the cw tags apply to this chapter! big shout-out to lyn for her beta and support ♥

Mercedes von Martritz is a Divinity School grad student who daylights as a barista at Holy Grounds, the student-run coffee shop. Sylvain brings her to the lunch table the next week.

He recounts the tale of their acquaintance like this: she once spilled his order of hot coffee on him, they had a laugh about it, and they've been dear friends ever since.

The necessary details that Mercedes fills in are as follows: after spilling the coffee, she invited him over to the apartment she shares with her brother to destain his white shirt. She offered him a slice of homemade apple pie for his trouble, which he mistook for a very different offer altogether. As the apple pie fell from her hands, he apologized profusely for the misunderstanding, and then proceeded to spend the next six months escaping the wrath of Mercedes's little brother, who happened to walk in at that very moment. (Side note: Mercedes's brother Emile is the owner of a large collection of antique weapons that promised of tetanus infection, among other detriments.) Not wanting blood on her brother's hands, Mercedes aided in Sylvain's redemption arc, and they've been dear friends ever since.

"Trash juice, high-pulp, 100%," is the review Felix leaves at the end of the story as he pilfers another meat skewer from Sylvain's plate.

"Hey," Sylvain protests half-heartedly. "In my defense, I'd just come out of being propositioned with crème brûlée the week before. If you think about it, that's a metaphorically _much_ less penetrable sur—"

"That's nice, Sylvain." Mercedes smiles, her eyes thinning into slits. She turns to Felix. "So, Felix, do you like coffee?"

Felix shrugs. "Prefer tea."

Mercedes starts bringing tea to their lunches. First it was the plummy honeyed-fruit blend that made Felix cringe. Then it was the Albinean berry blend that was slightly more tolerable but left a cloying aftertaste in his mouth. Today, it's Almyran pine. Felix presses his hands around the warm paper cup and sighs contentedly as the steam caresses his face.

"Better?" Mercedes's deep-set blue eyes are so soft, so pleased, as she regards Felix that it makes him want to draw back, which he physically cannot do because the hind legs of his chair are up against a tree trunk. And today, Sylvain isn't here to serve as conversational lubricant.

Felix crosses his legs under the table, angling his body toward the looming glass tower that is the Bioengineering building. A woman with mint-green hair that he often sees running around this side of the campus feeding stray cats is at it again. "You know, you don't have to have lunch with me when Sylvain isn't here."

"But I like you, Felix," she says. "You remind me of my brother."

Felix's fingers stiffen around the cup. "That's why you like me?"

"Well, yes…" she trails off, uncertain.

"Because I remind you of someone else?"

Mercedes's eyes snap open in understanding. "Oh! Dear, I..." She worries at her bottom lip. "I'm sorry, that's not what I meant. It's just that you're so honest with your reactions, and you either say what you think outright, or it's written all over your face. I find those same things cute in my brother, too." She taps the side of her own cup in thought. _Honeyed-fruit blend_ , it reads. "Except, he loves sweet things, and that makes him just a little bit cuter than you. Sorry, darling."

A laugh rips out of Felix. "Why would I want people to think I'm _cute_?"

"You might not want that from me, but everyone wants to be cute to the right person," Mercedes says, gaze slipping sideways suggestively. When she looks back over at Felix, her eyes sparkle like the first rays of sunlight hitting clear waters. "Have any idea what Sylvain's up to today?"

* * *

"Whoa, hey there, buddy," Sylvain says, holding up his arms.

Felix had almost head-butted him in the chin on his way into the apartment. Sylvain had apparently been on his way out.

"Where're you going?" Felix frowns. "I thought you didn't work nights anymore."

"Ingrid's down with something, and it's sadly not the lovebug." Sylvain steps around him, heading for the stairwell. "She asked me to cover her shift, so I'm gonna be out till close to midnight," he says before saluting a quick goodbye.

Tonight is the first night Felix has spent on his own in a while. He's a lone wolf by nature, so this is what he prefers, of course. He's had enough of watching Sylvain suck at Rock Band. Soon after they'd made their promise, Sylvain began working mornings at Beast Burger. Sylvain says it's because he wanted to leave afternoons free to work on his photography, that he takes the best pictures in the soft, dwindling light, but in truth he takes more naps than pictures in the afternoon, and spends his evenings bothering Felix.

Well, now Felix has the night off from all that. He's grateful for the silence. Or, he would be, if the apartment didn't feel so huge and empty without the noise of Sylvain's inconsistent drumming or the sound of his chipper voice asking Felix how his day was. Left to his own devices and caught up with all his classwork, Felix putters around completing small tasks he'd been putting off for an indeterminate 'later'. By 11, he's sufficiently tired from an uneventful but somewhat productive night and decides to settle in with some decidedly _non-musical_ video games until he falls asleep.

He's fresh out of the shower and heading for the mug of tea he'd left to cool on the coffee table, when he hears heavy footsteps pounding on the stairs. He glances at the clock. 11:45. Maybe Sylvain is home early?

Venturing into the entryway, he spends a few seconds contemplating whether he should open the door to check on the raucous. But what if it _is_ Sylvain on the other side, and he'll think Felix was just waiting at the doormat for his return like an over-eager _puppy_ all night? The peephole, Felix decides. That's the logical thing to do.

Just as he goes to do that, a thunderous clap of something crashing into the door with the blunt force of a wild boar makes him jump back. The impact is followed by a giggle.

It turns out that His Fall-Over Drunkenness does not handle his spirits well.

"Oh, good day, Felix!" Dimitri greets brightly, straightening himself out as Felix begrudgingly cracks open the door. The hot breath that meets Felix's face smells of something fruity and vibrant. His mouth is wine-purple, and Felix wonders if whatever he'd indulged in was expensive. He has suspected for a while now that the bunch of them are secretly rich, though none of them make flagrant displays of their wealth. "You look lovely, as always."

Felix is wearing the Smurfs t-shirt he's had since he was thirteen. "What do you want?"

"May I come in, please!"

"Sylvain isn't home," Felix informs him but pulls open the door the rest of the way. He squints at the wood paneling on the other side. "Did you _split_ our door?"

"Thank you for your hospitality!" Dimitri stumbles in, holding onto the wall for support as he toes off his shoes. "I shall wait for him inside!"

As Felix glares murderously at the fracture that he will have _no part_ in paying for, a looming shadow falls over him. When he looks up, he finds himself staring into the severe gaze of a dark-skinned man whose silver hair almost skims the top of the doorframe.

"I apologize for the disturbance," the man says in a voice so low and gravely it reminds Felix of sandstorms sweeping over desert dunes. "My name is Dedue."

"Felix. There are slippers under the shoe rack if you want."

They don't shake hands before both trailing in after Dimitri, whom they find peering at the electric water boiler with a puzzled frown, chin pinched between his thumb and forefinger. Felix sighs, checking Dimitri with his hip to set the water on reboil.

Dimitri wobbles like a long noodle for a moment before Dedue steadies him from behind with one hand on his shoulder, the other over his waist. Even for a man of Dimitri's size, Dedue's hand manages to cover the entire curve of it.

"Ah, Dedue!" Dimitri's eyes are twinkling stars in the countryside. "You are always here for me."

Felix lets his gaze linger for too long on the places they're touching before turning toward the cupboard to bring out more mugs.

He'd intended to set Dimitri up on the couch, but Dimitri gives up on walking before reaching the destination. Dedue makes to drag or carry him there, but Dimitri, with one cheek pressed to the flooring, insists that the cold of the hardwood feels divine.

Felix eyes the amoebic form formerly known as Dimitri. "Is this thing with Sylvain urgent?"

Dimitri hums, gazing dazedly into space. "In a sense. It just occurred to me, rather suddenly, that it's perhaps been a long time since anyone's told him that they're proud of him."

"And you...came all this way just to do that...?"

"Yes. Because I am proud of my friend," Dimitri slurs, raising one finger to the ceiling, then two. "Doing two jobs and two majors and still leaves time to check in with all of us in his own way."

Felix feels his brows furrow. "Sylvain has two majors?"

"He didn't declare the second one until recently even though that's what he's here for, technically. The school's been letting it slide because"—Dimitri waves his hand in vague circles—"you know."

Felix does not, in fact, know. He would press Dimitri for more details if Dimitri weren't sleepy as the dwarf, fighting to keep his eyes open. Besides, Felix would rather hear about Sylvain from Sylvain.

After tossing some spare blankets and couch cushions at Dimitri and Dedue, Felix heads back into the kitchen to bring around their teas. He fixes his gaze on the three mugs set over the coffee table. He trudges back into the kitchen to make a fourth, which he sets in the freezer to speed-chill. Sylvain likes his tea cold.

By the time Sylvain comes home, Dimitri is fast asleep with his head in Dedue's lap. Dedue's eyes are closed, but he's still awake, stroking his thumb over Dimitri's cheek every once in a while.

Sylvain's busy tapping out a message on his phone when Felix delivers Dimitri's message. He almost drops his phone, floundering in a frantic juggle to catch it before it goes crashing to the floor. "How drunk _is_ he?"

Felix takes out the tea from the freezer and slides it over to Sylvain. "How drunk do you have to be to body-slam your friend's door just to tell him you're proud of him? By the way, I am not chipping in for repairs."

"Ah." Sylvain chuckles. "Yeah, I was wondering about that." He raises his glass in thanks before taking a sip.

With nothing left to occupy his hands, Felix grabs the edge of the countertop and hoists himself onto it. Like this, he has a higher vantage point over Sylvain. It's weird being able to see the way Sylvain's red curls whorl from a single point.

Sylvain tilts his face up at Felix. His eyelashes are so fucking long.

Felix clears his throat, turning back toward the living room. He jerks his chin at the two giants cuddled up on the floor. "So are they...?" he trails off, eyebrows raised.

"Yes." Sylvain sounds like he's smiling. "Don't tell Dimitri because he doesn't know yet. But yes."

Felix snorts. "I see." Then: "So you _are_ capable of using his real name."

"Of course I am. He's just fun to tease." Sylvain leans into Felix's space, voice dropping down to a register that sends tingles up Felix's spine. _Is this the voice he uses to call girls_ sweetheart? He extends a finger to poke Felix in the cheek. "As are you, my soft, sweet Fe—"

Felix snatches the finger out of mid-air and yanks it backward until Sylvain is howling. It's loud enough that Dimitri stirs in his cocoon.

"Uncle! Uncle!" Sylvain hisses. Felix releases him with a humph. _Weak_. "My hands are the instrument of my craft, you know?!"

"You only need one of your ten fingers to press the shutter."

"I might need a couple more to actually hold the camera and develop the film, but"—Sylvain pouts—" _details_."

"I have never even seen you step foot into that cult closet of yours."

Sylvain shrugs. "Inspiration's been hard to come by these days."

It sounds like the type of artsy shit that people say with a beret slanted over their head and brandy swirling in their glass. But Sylvain is just sipping the shitty Nestlé iced tea he prefers over actual tea from leaves, and the make-up of his face is for once relaxed, contemplative.

Felix kicks the heels of his feet quietly against the cupboards.

* * *

GMU is on the quarter system, and the imminent arrival of finals catches Felix off-guard. (They _just_ got their midterms back last week, for crying out loud.) He is drowning in a long and hopeless list of things to do, and he has the insane urge to javelin his pen up through the ugly beige ceiling.

He's alone in the apartment again—Sylvain gone to Goddess-only-knows-where—and he's losing his mind. There's a sunny, beautiful afternoon waiting for him outdoors, and he hasn't swung his sword in six and a half days.

Gathering the remaining grains of his sanity, he lays down his pen kindly, takes his favorite sword in hand, and pull on his shoes. Between the four buildings that together comprise the off-campus student dorms, there is a small courtyard that Felix sometimes trains in. Technically, it is not public property, so technically, Felix is allowed to wave his "weapon" around. (So far, this is the only part of city life that he hasn't been able to get on board with. That, and the fact that he quite literally has not been able to get on board the public busses that come either three at once or not at all.)

When Felix ducks out of the back stairwell and onto the grassy field, he spots someone starfished in the middle of the courtyard.

Not just _anyone_ , of course.

Felix's heart speeds up as he takes in Sylvain's broad shoulders, his red hair in flames under the sunset, a pair of bright eyes closed to the sky.

 _He wants_.

As he draws near, he observes in curious fascination the way Sylvain stiffens in response to his footfalls. His ears perk. Fingers tighten over the camera resting over his stomach. He peeks open an eye, then relaxes when he sees that it's just Felix. He rolls over onto his side, squinting up against the sun.

"Hey roomie." He accompanies this with a wide smile and a little wave that's entirely unnecessary for the distance between them. Felix is stupidly enamored with the gesture. "You out here to practice?"

Felix presents his sword. "What else would I be doing?"

"Why don't you join the kendo club at school? It's related to your kumdo, right? If nothing else, they at least have the proper flooring and stuff."

"I don't need some sham of an instructor correcting my form."

"This Brigidi exchange student I talk to sometimes says the _sensei_ is really good. Fifth-dan black belt or something. I'm assuming that's high-ranking?" Felix feels his eyes widen as he nods. His _sonsaeng_ back home was only fourth. "Apparently she's also a Biochem prof? I see her feeding cats around campus sometimes, and I gotta say, she's got some _huuuuge_ —"

"I'm gay."

It doesn't quite just slip out. Felix has been thinking about it for months. Practicing it in bed as he stares at the chipped paint. He's been afraid of the words for so long but he's had enough of that feeling.

For how long Felix has geared himself up to wrapping his mouth around the words, the moment is of very little ceremony in both the way he blurts it aloud and the way Sylvain takes it in.

"All right, all right." Sylvain nods, flopping back loosely into the grass like he wants Felix to paint him like one of his French girls. Which. There are no girls. Because Felix is gay. (He aches to release the words into the air, again and again.) "Wellllll...I'm sure there are also some handsome fellas at the kendo club."

"I just want to practice," Felix says. "Not everyone does things for an ulterior motive."

"Aw, Felix, why you gotta put it like that…" Sylvain stares up at him with giant puppy-dog eyes. "I like to call it being _efficient_. Two birds with one stone. Seize the opportunity to wield your sword and your _other_ sword, if you know what I mea—wait wait wait." He laughs, curling in on himself in defense against Felix's incoming boot.

Then, he freezes.

Stares fixedly at something in the grass.

Felix moves to take a step toward whatever's caught Sylvain's eye, but Sylvain puts up a hand. His face is soft with wonder.

"Slowly," he whispers, the word floating up into the peaceful air that surrounds nature during twilight. "Don't scare her away."

With maddening care, Felix lowers into a squat next to where Sylvain's pointing. A yellow-green light flickers, then dims.

"It's a firefly," Sylvain breathes. He looks at Felix, wide-eyed, seeking confirmation for his observation.

A first, Felix doesn't see what the big deal is. Fireflies are everywhere. Except, when he thinks back more carefully over his time at GMU, he realizes he hasn't seen a single one here. Maybe they're a rarity in the city. Maybe the light in darkness that he takes for granted is a miracle to Sylvain.

In awed silence, they watch the firefly drift up over the tops of trees, disappearing into the rust-colored burn of the sunset. The sky is so tall and dark-bright at this magical hour when the colors shift rapidly but time moves so slow.

"I'm gay," Felix says again, just to test it out against this new backdrop. His chest is tight but it's from being so full of a wondrous feeling.

Sylvain watches him, gooey butterscotch leaking all over the place. "Am I the first person you've told?"

Felix nods.

"I'm happy you shared that with me," Sylvain says, with more bare honesty than Felix has ever heard from him. And as if Felix's heart wasn't already threatening to crack straight through his ribs, Sylvain pushes up onto his elbows and presses so close there is no space left for anything but each other in their eyes. He's close enough that Felix can see every streak of mahogany that radiates from his dilated pupils, hear every short intake of breath, smell the cherry Chapstick that makes Sylvain's lips so obscenely red. "Will you honor me with another one of your firsts?"

 _He's going to kiss me_ , Felix thinks and feels an odd calm fall over him like he's just connected the dots in the stars and read the blueprint for humanity's five thousand years.

A camera is thrust up between their faces.

Sylvain winks at him from behind the viewfinder. "I think you're gonna be my favorite model, Felix."

* * *

During spring break, Sylvain's budding talent in magic blossoms.

Felix is still trying to concentrate on conditioning the blade of his sword with clove oil when Sylvain clears his throat for the third time. He can feel his needy eyes wail for attention from across the coffee table. Felix polishes faster.

"Ahe—"

"You are the _worst_ ," Felix groans, giving in.

Sylvain smiles triumphantly, fanning out the deck of cards that's become a permanent fixture of his hand out under Felix's nose. "Pick a card, any card."

Felix reaches for a card from the edge of the deck and looks at it. The queen of hearts.

"Now, stick it back in," Sylvain instructs. "Where _eee_ ver you like."

After Felix replaces the card, Sylvain puts on a deliberate show of shuffling the deck. He pulls out all his flashiest moves, making the cards riffle and flutter and blur before Felix's eyes. They look like they're moving too fast and not at all.

Sylvain's expression takes on a look of intense concentration as he goes through the motions. It's a sort of laser-sharp focus that Felix has never seen on him before.

Felix doesn't realize he's been staring at Sylvain's face instead of his hands until he realizes Sylvain is staring back expectantly. There's a card flipped over on the table. The four of clovers. Felix frowns.

"Did I get it wrong?" Sylvain purses his lips briefly before his eyes drop down to the floor in front of Felix's folded legs. "What about that one?"

Felix follows his line of sight. There, sticking out from beneath his sword, is the corner of a poker card. When he flips it over, his eyes widen—not in surprise, but recognition.

This is Annette's trick. The one Felix helped her polish and perfect for _months_. Sylvain's only been at this business for a little over a week.

"How do you know this trick?"

"Mercedes," Sylvain answers, tucking the queen of hearts back into the deck. "One of her friends from the magic forums taught it to her. They also exchange cake recipes, if that isn't the _cutest_ thing."

Felix fiddles with the mounting of his sword, staring resolutely down at the twin wolves curled around opposite corners. "...You like girls like that?"

"Girls who bake?"

"Girls who are... _cute_." Felix grits his teeth, expecting mockery for his question. Well, maybe mockery is too cruel for someone like Sylvain. Teasing is more his brand, isn't it. Teasing and double entendre with a sprinkle of harmless flirtation.

But there's none of that. A long silence hangs there between them. Felix feels his stomach twist and knot and yank tight for good measure. Finally, he wills himself to peer up at Sylvain.

His cheeks are tinged with pink. Felix feels an answering blush heat up his own face.

"Yeah. Uh." Sylvain scratches his chin and shifts in his seat. But he doesn't look away. No matter what, Felix always finds Sylvain's eyes trained on him as if needing to see him properly. "I like cute."

* * *

The evening before his 21st birthday, Sylvain leaves the apartment and goes missing for 52 hours.

"Maybe we should alert the police," Dimitri suggests. "Put out a missing person's report?"

"Do you remember what he was doing, the last time you saw him?" Ingrid asks.

They were on the couch. 

Sylvain had just asked him to pick a card (for the sixth time that evening), and Felix rolled his eyes but reached for a card anyway; the press of their thighs against each other's was too pleasant to give up. Sylvain's phone had gone off with a ringtone that Felix had never heard before. It was one that made Sylvain's jaw clench for a split-second, and then the warmth against Felix's thigh was gone.

"Sorry, gotta take this one," Sylvain said with an apologetic smile. He gestured to the card in Felix's hand. "Hang on to that for a moment. And don't mess up my deck!"

When Sylvain disappeared into the hall and did not return for a very long time, Felix decided to start washing up for the night. When he wandered back out to the living room, rubbing a towel through his long hair, he noticed that Sylvain's keys and wallet were gone from the breakfast bar where he usually kept them. There was hole in the shoe rack where his cinnamon-brown Chelsea boots lived.

The red index card tacked to the fridge read:

> _Going out. Be back later. -S_

No flirty undertone. No squiggle in his sign-off. No lopsided heart sloppily filled in.

 _He'll come home before midnight_ , Felix tells himself, because Sylvain keeps his promises.

Sylvain keeps his promises until he doesn't. 

And 'later' isn't until _two nights_ later when Felix is in bed between fitful episodes of half-sleep, and the sound of keys in the door makes his eyes snap open. Adrenaline dilates through his veins as he leaps out of bed, bare feet slapping across the hardwood floor of the living room, thunderous against the kitchen tiles. At the door, he comes to a screeching halt, only barely managing to avoid crashing into Sylvain, who is is bent over, staring at the shoes he'd just taken off. Usually, he lines them up neatly on the shoe rack. He doesn't today.

He doesn't even look up.

Felix means to say something to express his concern, something sensitive, something that will neutralize the miasma of despair and whatever the hell that other odor clinging like fog to Sylvain is but—

"Where the _fuck_ have you been?!"

"I was trying to be quiet," Sylvain mumbles. "Sorry I broke our promise."

He's still not looking Felix in the eye. Felix gets the feeling that Sylvain is talking about other things he's broken, too, when the only thing he should be worried about is piecing himself back together.

"Whatever, I don't care about that." When Sylvain nudges past him toward the kitchen, Felix is fast on his heel. "What's the matter with you?"

"Don't worry about it. It's fine now."

"How is it fine? How can you look at yourself and say you're _fine_?"

Sylvain chuckles darkly. "Well, isn't it convenient then, that I don't have to?"

"Fuck, could you stop—" Felix's hand darts out to grab Sylvain by the arm, but it goes slack when Sylvain flinches at the point of near-contact. "What _happened_?"

Sylvain spears a hand through the dull and greasy curls that hang around his face. The facsimile of a smirk stretches like a taut rubber band across his mouth. It makes him look like he's choking.

"Hey, hey, didn't think you were the type to pry, Felix," he croons. "Did you start _caring_ for your hot roommate? Better save yourself from the heartache now, sweet country boy."

Felix stares at him, unmoved.

Sylvain's smile tightens as he pushes on: "Unless you're just looking for something physical…to experiment maybe? Practice for the real thing, so to speak."

Rage flares in the pit of Felix's gut as he watches Sylvain stumble around the kitchen doing nothing of consequence. He puts away a dish here. Rearranges a pot on the stove there. It's when he reaches the empty wall next to the fridge that Felix strikes, cornering him in two quick strides, hands slamming next to his shoulders.

Sylvain barely even looks surprised. "Haha, you know this isn't quite so effective when I have to look down—"

" _Shut the fuck up_ ," Felix seethes, then wedges a knee roughly between Sylvain's thighs, locking him in place. This is very much not the way he imagined doing that for the first time. "I _will_ squash your goddamn balls. Don't test me."

For a moment, it looks like Sylvain considers putting up one more act of resistance, but when he doesn't, Felix can't decide if that's better or worse. He watches the fringe of Sylvain's hair fall into his face as he wilts in the cage of Felix's arms.

"You...probably shouldn't do that." His voice is rough, like he's been crying. But his eyes aren't puffy, just dim and burnt dry. "Did you know that my family is still technically considered nobility? And my parents just rid themselves of their first son, so your making their second sterile might be a bit of a problem."

"What does that—" Felix scowls. "What does that even mean?"

"...I know this guy, you see," Sylvain says, after a beat, and it's like he's a different person now. "Let me preface this story with that it is, in its entirety, about a guy I know. An acquaintance that I heard about from a friend of a classmate of—well, whatever." He grins, lopsidedly. "This guy. He had an older brother."

The tone Sylvain uses is so fucked up. Felix feels his nails dig into the wall. He braces back the urge to punch it.

"Broken piece of shit. Like, literally. Born with a heart defect, messed-up immune system. It's a miracle he made it to his mid-twenties."

Felix swallows. "He...passed away?"

"Oh no, no, he's still alive." Sylvain laughs, and it's that same one that made Felix wince the first time he heard it bouncing off the walls in the bathroom. "That's the _problem_."

"I don't—"

"When people say they're gonna live every day like it's their last, they might go skydiving. Explore the wonders of the world. Miklan—this sad sop's brother, I mean—went about it a slightly different way." Sylvain wets his lips, leaning his head against the wall with a soft _thud_. "Got into trouble with the law one time too many. Tried to stab his younger brother a couple of times. In the back, of course, because poor, sick Miklan would've never won in a real fight. Lil' bro is very strong and strapping like that."

Felix takes a sharp breath. _Is that true, though?_ Sylvain, whose first instinct against an incoming boot is to curl in on himself. Tall, block-of-bulk Sylvain, who just lets Felix toss him around like it's nothing. Felix's arms drop away from him. He feels sick to the stomach. 

"Your brother tried to _kill_ you?"

Sylvain blinks. "Ah. No. My friend, or—what did I say? Acquaintance? Well, either way, the guy's fine. But I guess their parents didn't want their sick kid killing the one who can actually live long enough to carry on the bloodline and stuff. So. Bye-bye, to the defective one."

"Fuck," Felix hisses. He rests one hand on the handle of the fridge, needing something to hold. "What the _fuck_."

"But it's funny, you know," Sylvain continues, "because the thing that the parents don't see yet is that the other one isn't much better. He wasn't born broken, but he's not much better. He's just really, really good at hiding it."

"You're _shit_ at acting," Felix says.

Sylvain frowns, offended. "No, I'm not. I mean. This isn't about me, anyway. But I'm definitely not."

"Why do—" Felix bites his lip with a groan of frustration. "Why does _he_ have to hide at all? What's he got to hide? He's the only one his parents have now."

Sylvain makes a sound like crushed air, crushed lungs, his bones pulverized by the weight of what he carries. "You would think so, right?" He swipes the palms of his hands roughly over his face. "The parents, they're...they're not bad people, Felix. It's just that their love is conditional."

His voice breaks and his next breath comes out as a gasp. He rubs harder at his face, heels of his hands digging into his eye sockets. He whips away and makes a scene of inspecting his clothes.

"Oh would'ya look at this, my pants are soiled! I must wash them!" he declares, swaying over to the washer/dryer unit tucked behind a bifold door. He works on unfastening his belt pants and starts pushing them down as he walks. Somewhere along the way, one of his huge clown feet get tangled in the fabric. The way he struggles against the trap he'd set up for himself would be comical under any other circumstance. He's trying his best, but he can't get out.

Felix presses the tips of his fingers to the inside corners of his eyes. "I'm going to call Ingrid—" he begins, realizing belatedly that the sentence has all the energy of _I'm going to tell on you to Mom._

Sylvain stops fussing with his pants long enough to shoot Felix a glare. "Don't do that," he says sharply. "Do you even know what she's been through?"

"Is it relevant?"

Sylvain trips over his own ankles as he tries to take another step toward the washer. He flails his arms, seeking purchase, but finds nothing to brace his fall. He lands on the ground, huffing angrily as he continues to kick. He is breathing hard and ragged, hand on his chest. Felix is afraid he's about to have a heart attack. He _does_ have a family history of heart complications, after all.

"You're being a moron," Felix says as he crouches down next to Sylvain, who really didn't make it very far at all, and begins to extricate him from the twisted pant legs.

Sylvain lies there on the tiled floor, limp and useless. 

"She was engaged once," he says. "Right out of high school. Been dating the guy since _forever_ ; two of 'em probably came out of the womb holding hands or something. And then, one day, he's gone. Rocketed clean through the front windshield. Dead on impact. And she—" The knuckles of the hand clutching his chest turn white. "God, she didn't used to be like this, you know? Like yeah, she always had to be right and liked things done a certain way and whatever, but she—it was never about _control_." He's breathing so fast now, he sounds like he's on the verge of hyperventilating. "And Dimitri, too. Fuck. I wouldn't even know where to begin with fucking _Dimitri_."

"Is this relevant?" Felix asks again, evenly.

Sylvain's eyes are wide and disbelieving when they finally find Felix's. "How can it not be?"

"Doesn't seem to me like their tragic backstory makes yours any less real."

"I only have a stupid broken brother and parents with high expectations. How can I _possibly_ —"

"My brother died in the war," Felix says. "My dad was the one who gave orders to send his squad to the front line, and he hasn't been able to look at me since. I told him not to show me his pathetic face ever again, and he's"—Felix huffs, a bitter pill on his tongue—" _respected_ that request." He takes one of Sylvain's hands and pulls him firmly to a sitting position so that they're face-to-face. "So tell me, since you know _so well_ how this thing works, who do I stand behind in line waiting for my chance to cry? My dad loves me unconditionally, but he can't even bear to look at me. My brother is dead, but he was a fucking fantastic person when he was alive. You tell me how my pain measures to yours."

"Felix…"

"If you've got it in your thick skull that you deserve to hurt any less because the people around you must be hurting more, then you're even worse than trash juice. You're just a flaming heap of incombustible garbage polluting the air with your dumb—"

"I thought you were trying to comfort me," Sylvain interjects weakly.

"—assery." Felix takes a breath and shudders with the exertion of its release. "And. You're the only one who thinks that. The people you're related to suck ass, and I'm fucking sorry. But everyone else is standing out in the cold, waiting for you to let them in."

Sylvain sniffles, looking down at their clasped hands.

"I'm going to call Ingrid," Felix says, more gently this time, "to tell her that you're okay. I can try to convince her not to come over if you want, but she has a spare key."

Sylvain lets his head droop down past his shoulders. "I knew it was a mistake, giving that thing to her."

Felix wants to ask, _So why did you?_ but Sylvain looks worn down to the marrow, like he's exceeded his yearly quota for facing repressed grief all before sunrise. He helps Sylvain up off the floor. "Here, let's get you into bed. I'll jam the front door with my sword."

"You would _never_ ," Sylvain says, letting himself get corralled in the direction of Felix's bedroom. It's no secret that he prefers rolling around in Felix's bed over his own, though Goddess only knows why. Sylvain's the one who actually washes his sheets on a schedule.

"Yeah, no, I wouldn't." Felix sidesteps the fact that they could also just put up the metal chain designed for this very purpose. "I'll use those drumsticks from your Rock Band."

"If Ingrid brings Dimitri, he's gonna snap through those like Pocky sticks!"

Tucking the corners of his own comforter under Sylvain's chin, Felix rolls his eyes. "No more of your drumming? A true tragedy."

"You just don't know talent when you see it…" Sylvain mumbles but his words are already a jumble of letters as he settles into the warmth of the bed.

Felix watches his lashes flutter a few more times before landing on the curve of his cheek. He waits for Sylvain's breathing to even and slow before placing a barely-there flick on his forehead.

"I see _you_ ," Felix whispers. "Isn't that enough?"

* * *

Around the turn of fall, Felix starts a part-time job at the antiques shop Mercedes's brother manages. Schoolwork piles up. He is tired all the time.

He's zoning out at the water boiler, just watching the bubbles rise, when Sylvain approaches him, camera in hand.

"You ready for a break? It's a beautiful day out," Sylvain says.

Felix eyes the camera warily.

Sylvain smiles, batting his stupid long eyelashes at him. "Don't you remember promising me your modeling virginity?"

"I remember threatening to knee you in the dick for being a dick," Felix says.

But it seems that he's just a little weaker to Sylvain's dumb, handsome face than he'd like to think because not moments later, he finds himself out in the afternoon sun, still greasy and gross and generally unfit to be photographed. Sylvain doesn't give this any mind as he eyes the pink flush of the sky. He takes a deep breath, as if meaning to fill his lung with light.

"Isn't it so pretty?" he murmurs.

Felix watches the pale freckles dance across his cheeks in the dusky glow and thinks, _Yes, yes it is._ He might be more convinced now on why this is Sylvain's favorite time to take pictures.

The shutter clicks endlessly as they stroll leisurely down the block where they live. Felix feels like he has to do something interesting but doesn't know what. He swings around a telephone pole. Toes a giant crack in the sidewalk. Sits down next to a fire hydrant. He thinks he must be the worst model Sylvain's ever had and this is nothing more than a waste of time and film. Goddess. How much does film cost?

Just when he's about to spiral down the path of estimating the amount of money they're wasting on him and his sweaty ass, he peers up at Sylvain, who is wholeheartedly invested in the task at hand. His brows are furrowed in concentration, lips pursed. It's the way he looks when he asks Felix to "pick a card, any card." It hits Felix like hot tea on a cold day that he's the focus of everything right now. 

Through the viewfinder, Felix is all Sylvain sees.

Felix swallows, squinting against the setting sun. "What are you even going to do with these? I probably look like a tired unwashed rat in all of them."

Sylvain reaches out to tilt Felix's face away from the sun, fingers gentle on his chin. He gives no indication of having heard Felix's question as he steps back, readjusting the lens a few times before making the shutter fall.

There's a lull. Felix looks down at his tattered sneakers. Sylvain ducks his head over his camera, checking the last couple of shots. He probably figures that Felix isn't paying attention to him when he lifts the camera again, murmuring under his breath, "None of that matters to me because you're still so beautiful."

Felix is absolutely paying attention. His eyes snap up, and for a heart-stopping moment, they stare at each other through the lens. Slowly, Sylvain lowers the camera. His face is red up to the hairline.

"We should…" He clears his throat. "I mean. It's getting dark." (The sun still sits on the horizon.) "Maybe we should pack up here and head back."

He avoids Felix's gaze as he switches off his camera and fiddles with putting it away in its case. Felix knows he must say things like this to girls all the time. Sylvain Gautier has a _reputation_ , after all. But with the way the words had slipped from his lips, and the way he's reacting now like he's been caught red-handed wanting what he can't have, it almost makes it seem like—

"Felix?" Sylvain waves a hand in his face.

Felix blinks, taking a step back. Sylvain's blush has receded, but Felix is almost certain that his own face is still red as the fire hydrant next to him. "What?"

The smile on Sylvain's face is more hesitant than usual as he says, "I asked you what you wanted—"

 _You. I want_ you—

"—for dinner."

"...Oh." Felix blurts out the first thing that comes to mind, "Chicken?"

Sylvain nods once, curtly, then turns on his heel back toward the building. Felix is left with only his back, so he isn't sure which one of them Sylvain is talking about when he echoes back: "Chicken."

* * *

Felix spends the weekend away at an overnight training camp with the kendo club. The picture is waiting for him on his desk when he comes home.

 _Your move_ , it seems to say.

 _You're still so beautiful_ , Felix can still hear Sylvain say.

Plucking the picture off of his desk, he scowls at tired, greasy Felix.

"Chicken," he says.

* * *

Felix is picking up his textbook rentals at the student bookstore when he runs into Ingrid at the checkout line. The line wraps three times around the four open registers. The reality of having to make small talk is inescapable.

It's the first time Felix has really spend any significant time alone with Ingrid, and he's somewhat surprised to find that she's perfectly pleasant when she's not on anyone's (Sylvain's) ass about one thing or another. ( _She didn't always used to be like this,_ Sylvain had told him.) 

Or maybe it's just that they're in a bookstore, where she is in her element.

She has a couple new releases of medieval fiction in her arms, and from the sounds of it, she's read nearly every book about knights in print. Much to his chagrin, books about knights are very much something Felix can hold a conversation about. They were his favorite bedtime stories growing up because Glenn would do the absolute _worst_ princess voice, which would get Felix all riled up giggling. Their father would come in, pretend to be exasperated at them both and take over the part of Her Highness.

They're still a dozen or so people away finding escape from this capitalist hell when Ingrid makes a soft sound of exclamation. She swings her teal backpack off one shoulder, bringing it to the front, and starts to rummage through it. It takes her a minute to recover whatever it was that she was looking for in the depths of the bag, and she straightens with a relieved "Phew, thought I lost this for a moment." A triumphant grin lights up her face as she pulls out a thick brown envelope and hands it over to Felix.

"Here, can you pass this to Sylvain? I was going to drop them off at your place between classes tomorrow, but you'd be saving me a trip." 

Felix looks down at the envelope, tentatively taking it off her hands. It's almost full to bursting with a thick stack of something like cards in it. "Just for my information," he begins, frowning, "how many spare keys to my apartment are floating out there?"

"Just the one," Ingrid says. "You've never asked Sylvain about it?"

Felix has a hard time dissecting the look on her face. It's a slow process for someone like him, learning about another person. "What's there to ask? You guys have known each other forever. Isn't that just a thing you do?"

Ingrid hums quietly, tucking away a piece of hair that's come loose from her braid. "Within a week of Dimitri and me moving out on our own, Sylvain had wrangled spare keys out of both of us, but I've only had his for maybe half a year. And _he's_ been living in that apartment since he was a freshman."

It's clear that Ingrid is tiptoeing around what she wants to say for fear of giving too much away. As much as Felix wants to push for more, he refrains from giving in to the urge. In his mind's eye, there is Sylvain in a ball with pants tangled around his ankles on the kitchen floor, hugging his arms close around his body like he's trying to physically hold in his secrets. 

"He's weirdly private about himself for a guy so…"—Felix scrunches his nose—"... _like that_."

"He is _so_ like that," Ingrid agrees with a sigh of exasperation.

"He needs help," Felix mumbles under his breath, the words falling out of his mouth before he can think twice. 

Ingrid pinches her lips together. "Yeah, you know, some people go to therapy; some people get prescribed medication. And then there's _Sylvain_ , who feeds his brain the occasional fix of happy chemicals with his revolving door of flings. Though, I feel like that's died down since around spring or so…" Her gaze slides sidelong for a moment, as if to insinuate something, before centering back on Felix. She smiles, a little too wide to look innocuous. "Well, there's that. And then there's this." She nods toward the envelope. "His other happy pill."

Felix fingers the flap of the thick brown pouch. There's still so much he doesn't know about Sylvain, but he wants to. Goddess, he's had a taste of this man's vulnerability and now it's all he can think about monopolizing.

"Go ahead," Ingrid says, nodding at the envelope again. "He'd be okay with that. If it's you."

Felix doesn't let himself linger for too long on the implications of that remark before he flips the flap and reaches in for the contents. He knows the moment his fingertips graze the side of the stack that they're pictures. Of course.

He pulls out the top sheet by the edges, not wanting to leave fingerprints as evidence of his snooping. A smoke-grey sidewalk peers up at him. Several knots of weeds break free out of nowhere, through a crack in the concrete, struggling and losing (but trying all the same). Felix can't say that he understands much about photography but he's fascinated by this glance into Sylvain's mind and the things he notices when he looks out at the world.

He doesn't waste any time pulling out the next photo. Then the next. Then the next.

There are pictures of blurry subway trains roaring into the station, of goggle-eyed raccoons dumpster-diving late at night, of towering glass buildings freckled with stars carving fields of direction, radiating heat you would feel at the tips of your fingers if you would only stretch, just a little further.

Every snapshot is a love letter to the still-motion of city beauty, the kind that people do not find romantic: the piss-stained pavement, the push and shove of restless crowds, the nameless faces searching for a hand to hold under the neon glow of shop signs. It's a disgustingly apt reflection of what Felix was already starting to suspect about Sylvain's aptitude for hope and therefore equivalent tendency toward disappointment. He isn't great at repairing what's been broken, but he's also slow to throw the pieces away.

When Felix reaches the end of the pile, he carefully slips the pictures back into the envelope. He exhales through his teeth, letting out a half-laugh, half-sputter as he blinks himself back to reality. He stares at Ingrid, whose expression is as smug as a bug.

"Amazing, isn't he?"

Felix shakes his head in disbelief. "I thought he only took pictures of _girls_."

"Oh, that he does," Ingrid replies. "But he's also on a full scholarship for photography, so."

"I thought that was just—!" Felix gestures without much meaning. "He told me it was just a hobby! An _inclination_. He wasn't even a photography _major_ at the start of the school year."

"Yeah." Ingrid makes a face. "Long story there."

"That's what everyone keeps telling me."

"He's got a weird relationship with everything he likes," she says. "I've known him for years and never really seen him actually _take_ pictures. He just sends over the final product from time to time."

They've reached the front of the line. Ingrid is next. "He's never asked you to model for him before?"

Ingrid's eyebrows disappear under her bangs. "Goddess, _no_. That would require letting me actually get _close_ to his precious camera. He never lets anyone touch that thing. _Ever_." She perks up as one of the cashiers call for _Next!_ "Well, nice chatting with you, Felix. I'm heading into work after this, but I'll catch you later? Say hi to our least favorite artiste for me, yeah?"

"Sure," Felix says with a nod.

With Sylvain's photos burning a brand in his palm, he almost forgets what he's even here for when he's called up to the next open register.

* * *

Keep in mind that this is, in its entirety, a story about a stranger. A different guy from the one with the brother, of course, because what are the chances that all this would befall the same miserable sop?

Anyway. 

This poor son of a bitch had a bit of a problem. 

The problem is women but it's not just women. It's also men, to a lesser extent, but it's not just men, either. It's the map of scars criss-crossed over his back. It's expectations superimposed over a boy who aches for a smile from the family he loves unconditionally, despite clear signs that he's standing on a one-way street. It's a man who lies enough about who he is that he's left doubting the truth.

_Is it any of those things?_

_Yes_ , he'd said, meeting eyes with a petite brunette whose laughter shrieked of danger.

She had him on his knees before the door even closed behind them. Her slender fingers were tangled in his hair, pulling at the roots. He wondered why he thought he'd enjoy this. The streetlights sliced through the glass balcony door, knife-bright against his throat.

 _Yes_ , he'd said at one point before a thousand iterations of _no, stop, please_ met the hardwood.

He could overturn her meager form, her heavy-handed cruelty, but all he wanted was to be forgiven.

It was winter break and all his friends should have been home, wrapped around the fire with their families still, but it'd barely been two days with his phone off before the girl with an ass that won't quit came barging through the door, locksmith in tow. He'd watched terror pale her complexion until it was grey as the ashes of her lost lover. He stood in silence, just breathing. Long through the nose, short out the mouth. She sidestepped the mess in the entryway without a second glance and strode for the couch. There, she gathered a plush blanket into her arms and threw it around his slumped shoulders. She pressed herself to him, buried her face in his chest so that he wouldn't see her crying through his own dry eyes.

There were women who came after the brunette, but it was never really about the women. There were men, too, from time to time, but it was never about the men, either. There were now three copies of the key to the apartment with chipped, beige walls.

So, here it is: the origin story of the spare key. 

Not the one that Ingrid has of Sylvain's apartment, of course. Because remember? This is, in its entirety, a story about a stranger.


	3. act three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a huge thank you to [wolves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/helwolves) and [lyn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ixcarus) for looking this over!

Later that fall, Annette and Ashe swing by for a campus tour.

They've both been offered admission at Garreg Mach for the following spring. They have a couple other acceptances in hand, but Felix is fairly certain that come April he can count on seeing two itty-bitty sunbeams holding hands around campus. (Except—Felix narrows his eyes—has Ashe _grown_?)

Playing tour guide is not Felix's Goddess-given calling, but he's helped by all the people they keep running into along the way. First, it's Dedue in the greenhouse. Then, there's Dimitri getting barked at by dogs in the main quad as Professor Eisner unsuccessfully tries to distract them with tomatoes. After lunch, they run into Ingrid at the library, and it is in her (book-)loving care that they drop off Ashe to get a moment alone. 

"Something about knights," Felix says, motioning impatiently between the perplexed duo. "Discuss."

There's been something burning a hole in his hoodie pocket all day. It is, technically, his phone. But it's not the phone itself that makes his stomach churn.

"Look at you, making all these friends!" Annette beams up at him as they stroll alongside Strawberry Creek. "Chatting to people normally without threatening to cut them down? Limiting yourself to only one sword metaphor per conversation? Next thing I know, you'll be out doing _holiday shopping_."

Felix rolls his eyes. He watches students in white lab coats crouch down over slippery boulders to scoop water into orange-capped conical tubes. "They're all my roommate's friends."

"Aww, I hope you've never said that to them! They'd be so sad to hear that," Annette humphs disapprovingly. She swings around in front of Felix to block his path, hands curled into fists at her sides. Her eyes are round and cheeks rounder, puffed-out. Felix is reminded of the squirrels that run rampant around Garreg Mach, snatching tater-tots out of the hands of unsuspecting youths. "Friendship isn't something to take for granted, Felix."

Annette is sometimes a My Little Pony bot with the things she says, and Felix opens his mouth to recommend this as a side account to her indie covers main.

But then.

He thinks about the endless cups of tea Mercedes brings for him. Ingrid texting him sneak peeks of the pictures that Sylvain is apparently considering sending out to a big competition. Dedue bringing along giant Tupperwares of food like he's attending a potluck every time he comes over to the apartment. Dimitri sitting patiently through Felix's impromptu 45-minute lecture on sword metals when all he'd asked was "How are you today?"

And then there's Sylvain. And Sylvain. And Sylvain. And Sylvain.

"I don't. Take it for granted," says Felix, at length, rotating his phone by the corner over and over inside his pocket.

He can feel Annette studying him like a new video from her favorite close-up magic YouTube channel, scrutinizing every detail for a hint of the concealed truth. She must be satisfied with what she finds because she turns on her heel, chirping a firm "Well, good!" before taking stride by his side again. "I'm sure your dad will be happy to hear it. Little birdie told me you haven't called home even _once_ since you moved out?"

"That's some giant frizzy-feathered bird," Felix snorts, as the fiddling of his fingers inside his pocket intensifies.

Annette frowns down at the front of his sweater. "I hope that's not one of your knives in there. I just finished complimenting you about not using sharp objects as a social crutch!"

"It's not that," Felix says. Then swallows. He takes out his phone and thumbs to the draft of a message. He puts the screen in front of Annette's face. "Read it."

His hand is shaking, but if she notices she doesn't remark on it as her eyes move across the two lines of text on the screen. Felix feels like a puff of relief has been punched from his chest from the way her face crumples with a smile, tender and proud. 

"Oh, _Felix_ ," she says. "Are you going to send it?"

"Maybe," he says, peering off to where the path ends at the west gate of Garreg Mach.

"Is this because of what you said happened a while ago? With Sylvain?"

Felix knows he must have it bad when his heart skips a beat from just the sound of his name. 

"Maybe," he says again.

Annette sighs. "It's too bad he hasn't been around lately. I really wanted to meet him!"

"You'll meet him when you come here, probably," Felix says. "He's staying an extra year for his double major. Declared too late on the second one, the idiot."

"I'm sure you're _furious_ about getting to keep him for another year."

Felix slants her a look as his face starts to warm with color. "It's fine."

"You know, there's a way you can keep him for even longer," Annette says, practically giddy.

"Shut _up_."

"Oh, come on, Felix _—_ just take a swig of the trash juice already!" she says like she's coaxing him to try out her new cake recipe. ("I _promise_ , Felix, it's not even that sweet!" Which has _never_ not been a lie.) "You probably won't get an upset stomach from this one."

"Might get chlamydia though," Felix points out dryly.

"Well, that's what STD testing is for." She makes a scene of leafing through the numerous brochures she's collected throughout the day. "It's even covered under the student health insurance. Did you know that student health services offers a variety of _—_ "

" _Goddess._ We aren't even dating. Why are we talking about this."

"Because I believe in you!" Annette rallies with a small giggle. Her gleeful noisemaking is cut short when the campanile at the center of campus strikes on the hour. She lets out a shriek of dismay. "Oh no, I'm running late!"

"To what? Your train home isn't until 5."

"I'm meeting a friend for the first time today!" she says, stuffing the brochures messily into her purse. "And we're supposed to be meeting up at Holy Grounds right now!"

 _Ah_ , Felix thinks, watching Annette take off in a determined power walk back in the direction they came.

"Get the sweet apple blend. I think you'll like that one," he advises as she turns to wave him goodbye. She crashes into a group of the white coats and sends the orange-capped conicals in their hands flying. Felix sighs under his breath. 

"See you at the station, Annie."

* * *

Holidays are an entirely different beast in Garreg Mach compared to the stale affair it was in Areadbhar. The city gets a glow-up in all the places that Felix now knows by heart.

Ever since the photoshoot, Sylvain has been taking late shifts at Beast Burger again. He leaves for his freelance gig at the literal asscrack of dawn and doesn't come home until close to midnight. He doesn't break his promise again, but he also doesn't leave Felix little notes, tacked to the fridge with that same lewd magnet of a banana boning a daikon radish, like he usually would. 

A few months into living with Sylvain, Felix had begun collecting the cards into the top drawer of his nightstand. He's never shuffled back through them because _—_ according to Annette's shoujo manga _—_ that's what you do with love letters. And just to be clear, Felix does not in any way consider these hastily scribbled notes to be love letters.

Still, he thinks about the first note Sylvain left him. He doesn't have that one anymore. But it hardly matters because he knows it like muscle memory, like it's ingrained inside of him.

> _Hey gorgeous ;)_
> 
> _Welcome! I'm at work right now, but I'll be back by 10. You can visit me at the Beast Burger down the street if you're ever eager to meet before then. Otherwise, feel free to make yourself at home._ _♥_

For all the greasy cheeseburgers and wilted fries he's had from what Sylvain brings home, Felix has never actually stepped foot inside the Beast Burger down the street. At a glance, it's almost identical to the one they occasionally hang out at on campus.

The only salient difference is that this one is home to a tall ginger who looks unfairly adorable in that lame mustard-colored apron, watching Felix walk through the door with wide eyes.

"Felix," Sylvain says like he's seeing a ghost. Ingrid looks up from where she's chatting to a woman with long, lustrous hair and ample breasts that spill onto the counter dividing them. Ingrid is very, very red. "What are you doing here?"

"Just wanted to see if your fries suck right out of the fryer, or if you just take too long getting them home," Felix says, planting himself in front of Sylvain's register. It's an off-hour for munchies, with no line to order and only a few tables filled by weary students keeled over textbooks. "Also, have you done your holiday shopping yet?"

Sylvain's eyebrows disappear under his fringe. "I didn't think you were the type to care about that stuff."

"I don't." Felix tucks his hands into his pockets as he rocks on his heels. "But a friend suggested that I might start, and her advice usually works out for me."

"Plus, you're asking me to go with you?"

Felix's first instinct is to shrug, _Whatever, do what you're gonna do, I don't_ own _the mall, okay_. But during his stay in this place of great aspirations and steadfast affection, he's gotten better at figuring out what he wants.

_I'm going to tell him._

_I need to tell him._

"Yes," he says. "You should come."

"Okay…" Sylvain agrees slowly, like he's expecting a catch. "Well, heads up: I'm a little short on cash right now, so we'll have to hit some slummy stores, too."

"But you've been working like crazy lately." Felix frowns. "Where's it all going?"

Sylvain takes a minute to roll some words around his mouth before he replies, "It's not so much a matter of where it's _going_ as it is that it doesn't come from a handwritten check in the mail anymore."

When Felix manages to unpack the vague phrasing and carefully blank look on Sylvain's face, a small smirk finds its way to his lips. "Good thing at least _one_ of your majors is likely to result in a career that brings home the bread."

"Does the other one make me a bread-loser?" Sylvain pouts.

"Your losership needs no qualifier," Felix says, staring at his stupid siren-red lips. "But I guess if you're at least a happy loser, then that's not a bad deal, either."

The way that Sylvain's face brightens with a broad, dopey grin is even _stupider_ than his stupid, stupid lips. Felix is so mad. He's never wanted anything more.

"Just imagine, my sweet Ingrid," coos the woman with the hair and breasts in a lyrical tone, "that could be us, but less embarrassing in public."

Felix wants to burst into flames and turn to ash on the spot.

He turns on his heel, tailing out of there so fast that Ingrid's voice is a fading sound in the distance as she points out, long-sufferingly, "I don't know about _that_ one, but I think Sylvain's public embarrassment meter is still topped off from when his rap parody of our friend's valedictorian speech went viral."

* * *

They stroll along streets lined with dramatically lit store windows. It's the city in her finest gown, glimmering glamorously for all the lovers and strangers who gather to bask in her splendor. Having never stood center stage to so dazzling a scene, Felix wonders for several moments if he's wandering around in someone's dreams, with how surreal everything is.

Freckles of snow dust the air, only visible within the yellow cones of light falling from the heads of slender streetlamps. The wind howls, moistening Felix's face with a handful of the white ash that turns to water over his warm skin. He wipes himself dry with one mitten-clad hand, remembering that the snowfall is only meant to intensify as evening deepens into night. They should really head back soon, now that their hands are full with items to wrangle into red and green tissue paper for all their dearest friends.

Looped around one of Sylvain's wrists is a bag with a mishmash of items that he claims to be able to fashion into real presents. Around the other is the strap of the camera he clutches. Felix, looking doubtfully into his own bags, doesn't realize that Sylvain is gone until half a minute later, at which point he backtracks to find him stopped before a toy store window.

There's something about the way the twinkling lights from the display catch on Sylvain's features that makes his face glow, accentuating the gentle curve of his nose, the soft bow of his lips, the hard edge of his jaw. His breath touches the glass in round puffs of condensation, blurring a small section of the showcase before the fog clears, and the sequence repeats _—_ a clear, indisputable manifestation of the fact that he is here, standing before Felix, collecting white specks in his fiery hair, breathing life into his lungs. He is _alive_ , so why should the words continue to die in Felix's throat?

He asks for Sylvain's camera on impulse. The moment he finishes making the request, though, Ingrid's voice echoes in his head. 

_He_ never _lets anyone touch that thing_ _._ Ever _._

Anxiety paws at the walls of his chest. He's about to take it back when Sylvain turns and looks at him. He untangles the strap from around his wrist and hands Felix the camera without a word.

Felix feels his heart pounding.

Faster.

Faster.

The shutter falls, but Felix _—_

Felix is already there.

"I want you," he hears his own words tumble out into the open air. Not wanting to face the consequences of his confession quite yet, he ducks his face under his scarf. He's working up a decent sweat inside his jacket as snowflakes flutter down around them, and in the silence that follows, he distracts himself imagining how pretty Sylvain's pale lashes would look decorated by feathered crystals.

There's a long silence. Pressed by curiosity, Felix chances a glance up at Sylvain. He means to look away again, he really does, but how could he possibly do that when Sylvain is staring straight into him, lips half-parted and alluring as ever, holding Felix at the center of his orbit like he is something precious, something golden, something so dear to his heart that his voice cracks when he speaks:

"Me too." He doesn't even bother to clear his throat, just leaves it choked with emotion as he pushes on. "Felix, I _—_ I don't want to say that I can't live without you because I know I _could_. I did. But I never want to go back to that life again."

As the words fall over Felix and drape around his shoulders, they capture him in joy and relief and, if he's honest, a slight sense of madness that threatens to plummet through his heart and drain into his body _—_ drain until all logic and reason fall through a net that cannot possibly hold the weight of his feelings.

But then, there's this other part of him. The part that's high-key _livid_ about how this was _his_ confession and Sylvain just swooped in there and one-upped him by flinging his entire heart into Felix's hands with zero sense of self-preservation.

"I'm so _—_ " Felix grunts, blunt nails digging into his palms. "I am _so—_ "

"'In love with you'?" Sylvain tries with a shaky laugh.

" _—fucking pissed at you_ ," Felix grits before he yanks Sylvain down by the lapels of his peacoat so that they're nose-to-nose and butterscotch is all that he sees. "Is that what you want to tell _me_?"

"Yeah." Sylvain swallows as his gaze flickers down to Felix's lips. "Yes. I'm going to tell you I love you and then kiss you on the mouth, hopefully for a very long time, or many, many times _—_ I don't know which you prefer _—_ so. Please kiss me back, okay?"

"Okay," Felix says. And because Sylvain deserves to know, too, that this is not one of the countless things that's been decided for them: "That's exactly what I want. Except I'm going to tell you that I love you first."

Felix watches starbursts sparkle in Sylvain's eyes as he chuckles quietly, tilting his head with a hushed "I love you, too" falling from his lips, before his hands find Felix's face and he's gently guiding them together to meet in the middle. And Sylvain's lips don't quite taste of constellations in the sky or the promise of five thousand years or even the girly Chapstick he's always wearing because they'd both smothered their bread with an ungodly amount of garlic paste at lunch today but it's fine, _it's more than fine,_ that their first kiss tastes like casual Italian dining and their second kiss has undertones of the vending machine creamsicle that Sylvain polished off for dessert. None of that matters when their mouths are slotting together for a third time, and Felix realizes yes, yes, this is his preference, _Sylvain_ is his preference.

When they pull back for air, finally deciding that they can bear to not kiss each other for a few seconds, Felix finds himself immediately distracted by the thought of lifting the camera dangling from his neck to capture the insanely, _unfairly_ gorgeous sight before him: of Sylvain's shiny red lips, his eyes vibrant and alive, the flush of his cheeks, the way his skin glows with a light sheen of sweat—

Sylvain chooses that moment to lean in next to Felix's ear, laying down another heartfelt confession before licking it away, and all thoughts of photography vanish like magic.

They share a smile. The shutter doesn't click, but that's okay. They'll remember this one for a while anyway.

* * *

A week later, Felix finds a picture of Sylvain smiling up at him from his desk, bathed in the warmth of holiday cheer. It comes with a message, written carefully over a brightly colored index card. It is green today.

> _Thank you, for seeing me properly. ♥_

Felix pins the picture up over his desk next to a greasy stranger who is chicken no more.

* * *

Fingers tapping softly over a screen. A few seconds later, the muffled vibration of an incoming call.

Felix rolls his eyes and keeps on hunting monsters.

"Are you gonna answer that?" Sylvain asks. He's wrapped around Felix from behind like a big heated blanket. His minty breath tickles Felix's cheek.

"...It's my dad. He's returning a text with a call like an old person."

"To be fair, I assume he _is_ an old person. You're talking to him again?"

"No." Then: "Maybe."

"That's great, Felix. I'm happy for you."

"Shut up." Felix bites his lips. Hesitates. "Ever been to Areadbhar?"

"Where the base is? No, but—" The little gasp that Sylvain lets out is the harmonic equivalent of a lightbulb turning on. "Felix Hugo Fraldarius, is this a meet-the—"

"It's a place with no sidewalks. 'Dining out' means fast-food chains off the highway." Felix puts his game on pause, twisting around to face Sylvain. "It's a place where people like us don't hold hands in public."

"I see." Smooth, shiny butterscotch. Sweet in the loveliest of ways. "I'll still put my hand on standby in case you ever feel a little adventurous."

"..."

"..."

"We can be adventurous," Felix decides.

"Yeah?" The brittle-bright emotion shining in Sylvain's eyes takes over like loosestrife, a small thicket of blooms that invades every corner of his face—until Felix feels it taking root in him, too.

"Yeah. I want that for us.”

Grumble.

Kiss.

Hand in hand.

"Me too."

* * *

If Felix had to put a finger on where it all began, he would choose this place.

"Not the bathroom?" Sylvain asks.

" _Not_ the bathroom," Felix stresses. 

Spring has begun to thaw away at winter, but healing is rarely a quick or gentle process. After the first spike of warmth that sparks revival, there's a long ways to go before life returns with vigor. Sometimes, it's impossible to mend what's been broken. Sometimes, it's all about patience and faith.

Either way, the soil is still partially frozen under their bodies, and Felix finds himself chilly. He huddles into Sylvain's chest to share his heat.

"I'm sure you were already in love with me the moment you saw my note on the fridge," Sylvain muses, tangling his fingers in Felix's hair. At the end of last summer, Felix had cut it short, but now it's grown long again. It's been the object of a mild obsession between them.

Felix scoffs, "As if. Just made me wonder how anyone could manage to draw such an ugly heart mark."

This makes Sylvain laugh, the sound rumbling against Felix's cheeks. "Mean."

"You dig it, weirdo."

"Just a little."

They are in the tiny courtyard blocked off to all sides by old, grey apartment buildings. They lie in the yellowed grass, basking in the calm of yet another twilight. Sylvain's sneakers tap a gentle rhythm against Felix's boots.

They never see another firefly after that first time because fireflies are a rarity in the city. Thankfully, fireflies aren't the only things that shed light in the darkest of days.

* * *

Felix opens the door to an empty apartment. The sight of it doesn't make his gut drop out anymore. He thinks it's because, nowadays, solitude for him is a choice rather than the default.

Earlier, he'd dropped by Holy Grounds for a cup of Mercedes's Almyran pine, and on his way out she'd asked him to double-check that Sylvain didn't forget about their plans to meet for Magic Night with Annette. Poking his head past the door left slightly ajar, Felix peers into Sylvain's room. The room is slightly more unkempt than usual, as if Sylvain left in a hurry.

Oh, well. Seems like he remembered, at least.

Felix lingers in the doorway, itching his calf with a socked foot as he scans the room he's gained intimate familiarity with over the past couple of months. His eyes fall over a stray index card abandoned in the middle of the floor. When he picks it up, the sloppy doodle on the unlined side makes him smile. It's a sketch of a juice box, the front face of it proudly boasting of "Trash Juice! High Pulp! 100%!"

He's just about to place it on Sylvain's desk when his fingers brush over the indent of writing on the backside. He flips it over to see Sylvain's loopy cursive letters:

> _Everyone has a favorite story._
> 
> _Mine ends with me falling in love with you._

There isn't even a heart on this card, but Felix keeps tracing the words with his eyes until the ink smudges and bleeds into his memory. He picks up a pen, gnaws the back end of it for a couple seconds, before scrawling out his own sharp-edged scribble:

> _Well, spoiler alert: I'm in love with you, too._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> not everything changes but small somethings do. it’s a lifetime ahead of learning and unlearning and relearning about a love that gives you courage instead of fear.  
> that’s the type of story i wanted to write for these two. it’s my first time taking these guys out for a spin, and i already can’t wait to do it again.  
> altho i do wish there was more group shenanigans and ashe and free donuts on campus.
> 
> hope this was an enjoyable read! :) 
> 
> [talk to me about sylvix/fe3h/cats](https://twitter.com/orgiastique) | [RT this fic](https://twitter.com/orgiastique/status/1236640654186422275?s=20)


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